


The Road Less Traveled

by purple_cube



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-07
Updated: 2014-10-07
Packaged: 2018-02-20 07:26:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2420147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purple_cube/pseuds/purple_cube
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You're supposed to be dead," he says discreetly.</p>
<p>She looks across at him sharply. "And you're supposed to be in District Two. Or so my TV tells me."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Road Less Traveled

 

 

 

The Eastern districts are coming to the end of a late summer heatwave when he sees her, and it takes more than a few seconds to stop blaming the sunshine and the humidity and the exhaustion – and admit to himself that it truly _is_ her.

 

_Madge Undersee_.

 

The market is still busy, in spite of the oppressive heat of midday. He watches for a moment, taking in the way that her gaze keeps drifting back to one particular corner of the display, despite her best efforts to appear nonchalant in front of the stall owner.

 

Gale grins as the young vendor glances in Madge’s direction, clearly aware that he’s about to make a sale.

 

“See something you like?”

 

They both watch her shrug. “Just browsing.”

 

She doesn’t give any indication that she notices when Gale edges closer, rounding the corner of the table until he is by her side.

 

“You’re supposed to be dead,” he says discreetly.

 

She looks across and up at him sharply, recognition coming quickly. “And you’re supposed to be in District Two. Or so my TV tells me.”

 

“Vacation,” he explains simply.

 

She snorts. “To Eleven? Not much of a vacation, if you ask me.”

 

“More of a _working_ holiday,” he admits with a wry smile. “You look well,” he adds a moment later.

 

And she does. Her hair is shorter than it had been the last time he saw her, cropped above her shoulders. She doesn’t seem any thinner, so whatever she’s been doing in this district, it’s been enough to put food in her mouth on a regular basis.

 

“Better than most from Twelve, I imagine.”

 

He winces at the reminder, firebombs and screaming and ashes never far from the forefront of his mind. “Is there anyone I know here with you?”

 

She averts her gaze as she shakes her head faintly. “No.”

 

_No family, no friends_. “You got to Eleven by yourself?”

 

It’s her turn to wince. “Wasn’t easy,” she admits so quietly that he barely hears.

 

“Does Katniss know?”

 

Madge shakes her head. “No. I know what happened, and after the trial, I figured that she would just want to be left alone to move on. The same way I do,” she adds with a pointed look.

 

He nods, both in understanding and in promise. But he can’t stop himself from asking the next question. “Are you okay here? Do you have...what you need?”

 

_Money, food, friends,_ he thinks to himself. _Do you have what you need to survive?_

 

“It’s been two years, Hawthorne,” she says in that voice that always told him when he’d stepped over an invisible line. What surprises him is that he cares so much more about upsetting her now than he used to. “I’m not some damsel in distress. I know how to take care of myself.”

 

_Of course she does_ , he thinks _. She’s here, isn’t she?_

“Sorry,” is all he says out loud though. “I didn’t mean –“

 

She interrupts him, chin raised defiantly. “You didn’t mean what, exactly? To treat me like some clueless Merchant who’s never had a bad thing happen to her in her entire life? No, that doesn’t sound like you at all.”

 

Her words are dripping with a level of disdain that he hasn’t heard in years – not since his encounters with Johanna Mason – and he knows that she is surprised when laughter bubbles up from his throat.

 

“Guess some things never change, do they?”

                                             

Her expression softens at both his words and his reluctant smile. “Guess not.”

 

“I’m sorry,” he says, much more sincerely this time. Looking across the courtyard, he spies a stall with an assortment of breads and pastries on display. “How about we get something to eat and swap war stories?”

 

She follows his gaze, and he thinks that he catches a ghost of a smile at the corner of her lips. “Only if you’re buying, Hawthorne. After all, you’re the one with the high-flying government job.”

 

“Fine,” he concedes as he follows her, leaning close to her ear as he speaks. “I probably owe you, anyway – I overcharged for those strawberries over the years.”

 

When she glances back, her eyes shine in a way that he doesn’t ever remember seeing. “I _know_.”

 

 

*

 

“Why don’t you go back to Twelve?” he asks when they’ve both finished eating. She had steered him along a narrow path from the market in the Main Square, and he had huffed in pleased laughter to find a bubbling stream at the end of it. Now, she sits next to him with her knees drawn into her arms while he stretches his legs out in front of him.

 

“Why don’t you?” she bites back, though with much less venom than she had used to deliver her earlier words. But then she turns to look at him, and something in his expression makes her own features soften. He imagines that her answer would be similar to his own.

 

“How is your family?” she asks instead.

 

“Good. Better than ever,” he admits. “The schools in Two are so much better than the one went to, and people out there actually have a decent chance at earning money, you know?”

 

She shakes her head to indicate that she doesn’t. “We’re still struggling here,” she reveals. “It’s better than it was before – or so people keep telling me – but it’s nothing like what they show on the television.”

 

“The documentaries that they’ve been running…they tend to be the best-case scenario,” he admits reluctantly. “Plutarch, the Head of Communications, thinks it wouldn’t be good for morale to show a more realistic picture.”

 

Madge huffs in disgust. “Some things never change, do they?”

 

“They _are_ changing,” he insists with a glare. “Didn’t you hear what I just said about District Two? Things _are_ changing…they just take time.”

 

“Tell that to the people who are still struggling to feed their families –“

 

He groans in frustration. “I’m not taking this from you, Undersee.”

 

Getting to his feet, he shoots her a withering look. “Have a nice life,” he calls over his shoulder as he walks away.

 

He makes it halfway through the market before he hears rapid footsteps and feels a tug on his sleeve.

 

“Sorry,” she says when he whirls around to face her. “It was a stupid thing to say…given our respective histories.”

 

“It was.”

 

Madge sighs. “I can’t let you leave like this.”

 

“Why do you care what I think?”

 

He expects an angry retort, but instead, her teeth clamp down on her bottom lip as she averts her gaze. “Yours is the first familiar face I’ve seen in over two years, Gale,” she replies after a while. “I said I want to be left alone, and that still stands. But seeing you again made me ache for home in a way that I haven’t let myself in a long time. So that’s why I care what you think. Because you’re the only link that I have to home right now.”

 

“You could go back,” he suggests softly. “You don’t have to stay there…just see it. Visit Katniss, I’m sure she’d love to see you again.”

 

“I will one day.” She finally meets his gaze and gives him a brief smile. “Thanks for lunch.”

 

She turns away from him, and he watches her mass of blonde hair sparkle in the sunlight until she disappears into the crowd.

 

He hesitates only a moment before deciding to follow her home. He knows that he shouldn’t – she’ll be furious if she sees him.

 

She _is_ furious when she spins around a mile later, and on what he presumes is her doorstep.

 

“What do you want from me, Gale?”

 

He slips out from behind the tree, doing his best to seem apologetic. “Just wanted to make sure you got home safely.”

 

“Liar.”

 

Walking towards her, he holds his hands up as he admits the truth. “I wanted to see where you lived. I wanted to know that you were okay.”

 

“Why?”

 

“I don’t know.”

 

A noise from behind the door to the modest-looking home seems to surprise her, and she quickly steps away from the porch.

 

“I don’t live here,” she explains quickly. “I just wanted to see how far you would follow me.”

 

“Where _do_ you live?” he asks softly, unsure of whether he’ll receive a straight answer.

 

“I’m not telling you.”

 

“But you _do_ have somewhere?”

 

“Why do you care?”

 

He’s close enough to reach out and touch her if he wanted to – if he thought that she would let him. “You’re from Twelve,” he says simply. “That alone makes me care.”

 

“Where are _you_ staying?” she asks, turning the focus of the conversation to him.

 

“Where all the government reps stay,” he admits with some embarrassment. It’s lavish to say the least, a hangover from Snow’s regime, and he feels more than a little guilt in knowing that these places still exist when most of the districts are struggling to find their feet in a post-war world.

 

“Do you care enough to take me there?”

 

He raises an eyebrow, and to her credit, she doesn’t falter or flinch.

 

“I’m not going to sleep with you, Hawthorne.”

 

“What makes you think I want you to?” he asks with a grin.

 

She shrugs. “I do what I need to, to get by. For whatever reason, you’re feeling guilty over seeing me today. So fine. If that means I get to spend the night – _alone_ – rolling around in luxurious silk sheets, then I’ll take it.”

 

“And where am _I_ supposed to sleep?”

 

She tilts her head as she ponders his question. “I’m guessing they gave you one of the suites at the former Mayor’s home?”

 

He nods.

 

“Then you can take the couch in the lounge area.”

 

*

 

True to her word, Madge marches into the bedroom as soon as he lets them into the suite, calling out a _thank you_ over her shoulder before slamming the door. He swallows his disappointment at the thought of not seeing her again until morning and makes his way to the lounge area.

 

His lips tug into a smile at the abrupt sound of the bedroom door opening, but he is careful to keep his expression neutral when he hears her approach.

 

“Thought I should at least give you a pillow,” she says brightly – before throwing the soft item at his head. He blinks harshly as it hits his temple with a dull thud before falling to the floor.

  
“Thanks,” he spits out through gritted teeth.

 

The largely silent room erupts with her delighted laughter – it sounds so foreign that it makes him wonder if he has ever heard it before. She must mistake his expression for hurt, because she schools her own features into a mixture of embarrassment and remorse.

 

“Sorry,” she says a moment later. “You can have the blanket too, if you like. I won’t need it in this heat.”

 

“S’alright. I won’t need it either.”

 

“Goodnight then. And thanks.”

 

He bends down to reach for the pillow, watching her retreating footsteps from the corner of his eye. “’Night.”

 

The light that shines beneath her door extinguishes shortly after. Gale gets to his feet, before groaning at the realization that he had taken his luggage straight to the bedroom upon arrival. With a sigh, he strips down to his underwear before plumping the pillow and lowering himself onto the length of the couch.

 

Sleep doesn’t arrive as swiftly as he would like, which is why the sounds of low conversation from the adjacent room catches his attention. He gets up, making his way as quietly as possible to the door. Even with his ear against the wood, he still can’t make out the words, but she certainly seems distressed.

 

_Is she talking to someone?_ He can’t remember if there had been a telephone in the room when he had breezed through earlier to drop off his luggage. Maybe there is, and she’s using it.

 

He glances back at the couch, wondering whether to return to it. But then she groans as if she’s in pain, and he finds himself bursting through the door without a second thought.

 

Madge’s body, clad in only a long tee-shirt that looks like one of his, lies still on the bed – but her head thrashes almost violently from one side to the other.

 

He doesn’t hesitate to cross the short distance and lower himself down next to her, pulling her into his arms.

 

“Shh, it’s okay,” he whispers as he strokes her hair. He feels her tense in his arms for a moment before relaxing into his embrace. Her labored breaths slowly even out until her chest rises and falls in time to his own.

 

He doesn’t even realize that she is awake until she speaks.

 

“Thank you.”

 

Her forehead rests against his throat, so he knows that she feels it when he swallows.

 

“You get nightmares, too,” he states quietly. “The firebombs?”

 

He feels her head move in an affirmative nod.

 

“Me too. Not every night, but more often than I’d like.”

 

“I’m sorry you had to go through that on your own,” he admits after a while, still gliding his fingers slowly through her hair. “I guess that’s why I feel so guilty. Because it was hard enough for me, but I had my family and people willing to help find food and keep our spirits up. And it was only a few days before District Thirteen came looking for us. I can’t imagine how hard it must have been for you.”

 

He’s beginning to think that she has drifted back to sleep when he hears her voice.

 

“I wasn’t alone.”

 

He tries to shift, to pull away so that he can see her face, but she grips his arms tightly and buries herself further into him, shaking her head lightly.

 

“We had dinner guests that night,” she continues when he relaxes beneath her once more. “The Pearsons.”

 

He recognizes the name from Town, though he doesn’t know them personally. They must have been one of the many families that refused to trade with him.

 

“They had two children, a boy in my year at school and a girl who was a year older. We went out for a walk when Johanna attacked Katniss in the arena – I couldn’t bear to watch anymore and made an excuse to leave, and they came after me. We were halfway to the Square when the first bomb fell. We started to run back, but all of a sudden there seemed to be fire all around us.

 

“We ran in the only direction we could to get away from it. We made it to the woods, but I had no idea where we were heading. We just kept running. We never saw anyone else.”

 

“What happened to the Pearson kids?”

 

“Beka slipped and fell into a ravine, injuring her leg on the fourth day. We didn’t realize how serious it was until it was too late. She died on the sixth day.”

 

He tightens his grip on her, hoping that it’s enough to convey his sadness.

 

“Rhys made it to Eleven, but we split up to scavenge for food one day and I never saw him again.”

 

“Peacekeepers?”

 

“Maybe. They were particularly brutal here before the war. Or maybe he just decided that he needed to look out for himself.”

 

He wouldn’t blame her if she had sounded bitter, but she doesn’t. When she doesn’t offer up any more information, he lets his eyes drift shut.

 

It’s still dark when he wakes again, this time to the feel of Madge’s fingertips tracing patterns across his chest.

 

“Having fun?” he asks lazily.

 

“I can have more fun now that you’re awake.”

 

He feels her body shift above his until their mouths line up. He realizes that she’s waiting for a sign to continue, so he digs his fingers into the small of her back.

 

She kisses him, tentative at first, but with growing confidence with every passing second. When she pulls back, he adjusts both of their bodies until she is lying flush against him.

 

“I thought you weren’t going to sleep with –“

 

She cuts him off with another kiss, more frantic and heated than the last.

 

“I changed my mind,” she tells him breathlessly when she finally breaks away. “That alright with you?”

 

He knows what this is. A desperate desire to feel alive, to prove that the firebombs that burn beneath her eyelids can’t take her as well as everything and everyone she ever knew. It’s a need for reassurance that she is real and her nightmares are not.

 

“It’s alright with me,” he says softly, before reaching up for another kiss.

 

*

 

His first thought in the morning is to curse himself for not drawing the curtains tight, groaning at the bright sunlight that streams through the considerable gap in the fabric. His second thought is that the bed feels entirely too big.

 

This isn’t his bed.

 

_Eleven._

 

The bed feels big for a different reason when he looks around and realizes that she isn’t here. Swinging his feet onto the ground, he pauses to don his undershorts before making his way to the lounge.

 

There is no sign of her here either.

 

A sharp rap on the front door gets his attention, and he moves quickly to open it. The porter’s eyes widen at the sight of his exposed chest before flitting away. He holds out a folded piece of paper. “A message for you, sir.”

 

Gale takes it, muttering a quick _thank you_ before shutting the door.

 

The note turns out to be work-related, from a member of his camera crew, and he tries to ignore the dull ache of disappointment in his chest.

 

*

 

His phone is ringing loudly when he stumbles through the apartment door a week later. Dimly aware of the time, he realizes that his siblings must still be at school, and his mother at work.

 

“Gale Hawthorne.”

 

“Hey.”

 

He recognizes the soft-spoken tone immediately. “Katniss.”

 

They talk for a few minutes. He tells her about the trips he has been on since they last spoke, to Districts Four, Seven and Eleven.

 

“I had a visitor,” she says quietly when he finishes. “She said that you met her when you were in Eleven.”

 

“Madge,” he guesses with a sigh. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”

 

“It’s okay. She told me her reasons, and why she asked you not to say anything. I get it, I think.”

 

“Is she okay?” he asks, hoping to sound only mildly interested.

 

“She’s doing well. In fact,” she adds after a pause, “She’s thinking of coming back next month and staying for longer.”

 

“Are you and Hazelle still coming, like you planned?” Katniss asks when he doesn’t respond.

 

“Yeah. Yeah, we’ll be there.”

 

*

 

But when the following month arrives, it brings with it a sudden change in weather that kindles a wave of sickness throughout the district. Both Rory and Vick pick up the virus and are advised bed-rest until it passes. Hazelle and Posy wave him off at the train station regretfully – it would have been their first visit to Twelve since the war, and he knows that his mother in particular had been keen on seeing the progress that has been made.

 

Gale trudges up the hill to Victors’ Village alone, having declined Katniss’s offer to meet him at the station. The landscape still seems so foreign, despite intensive restoration projects, and it’s hard to ignore the images of burning and destruction that flash through his mind.

 

He breathes a sigh of relief when he arrives at his destination. These houses are unchanged, and although they’re associated with the Games, he also remembers the feeling of relief that flooded him once the Everdeens were settled here, knowing that they wouldn’t go hungry – and in knowing that if something were to happen to him, Katniss would have ensured that his family were safe too.

 

He raps his fist against that familiar blue door. It soon opens – but it isn’t Katniss who greets him.

 

There’s a small smile on Madge’s lips, but her voice is hard when she says his name. “Gale.”

 

The gap widens further, and she holds her arm out to invite him in. “Katniss had to run some errands. I said I would wait here in case you turned up while she was out.”

 

He steps over the threshold, closing the door behind him. “Where’s Peeta?”

 

“The bakery.”

 

They watch each other for a moment before she turns and makes her way to the kitchen. “Your room’s on the first floor, at the back of the house,” she calls over her shoulder.

 

He waits until he is safely concealed in the guest room before closing his eyes and letting the memories of _that_ night invade his mind. Memories of her, and the way that she had felt, the sounds that he had elicited from her.

 

Voices filtering through from the floor below prompt him to get up and change into fresh clothes after a day on the train. _Katniss must be back._

 

When he finally steps into the kitchen, his host pulls him into a hug. He peers at Madge over the top of Katniss’s hair, catching her eye until she turns away from them. She studiously ignores him for the rest of the day, answering his questions in short and sharp bursts and devoting the rest of her attention to Katniss and Peeta.

 

And he would have thought that that would be the end of it, were it not for the way that her eyes dart in his direction when she thinks that he isn’t looking.

 

*

 

He only senses her presence when a floorboard creaks beneath her foot. Cracking an eye open, he watches as the robe slips from her shoulders, only moving onto his back when she steps closer.  

 

“You move like a hunter,” he whispers as she climbs onto the bed, approaching him on her hands and knees.

 

She plants her palms on the mattress above on either side of his head before settling her lower body onto his. “I’m an extremely fast learner. It was a particularly useful trait to have when I left Twelve.”

 

He watches her expression carefully as he moves his own hands to her hips, slowly and carefully.

 

“I won’t break, Hawthorne.”

 

So he sits up, as if he’s about to kiss her. When she leans forward to meet him, he grins wickedly before using his weight to flip her onto her back and pinning her body to the bed with his own.

 

They both freeze for a moment, worried that the groaning of the bed will have caught the attention of their hosts.

 

“Subtle,” she eventually whispers, and he snorts in response.

 

When his fingers dip beneath the waistband of her sleep pants, she moans against his temple.

 

“Quiet,” he murmurs.

 

Her response is to sink her teeth into the bare curve of his shoulder. He grunts in displeasure, and feels her upper body ripple in laughter.

 

“Shh,” is the whisper in his ear.

 

Their verbal teasing ends abruptly when his hand travels further.

 

After, they lie on their sides, facing each other. Her hair is longer than it had been last time they did this, and he finds himself looping a lock of it between his fingers and twirling idly.

 

“I’m leaving tomorrow,” she reveals quietly.

 

He meets her gaze, and sees the unspoken challenge in her expression. He could ask her to stay. He could tell her to visit Two sometime.

 

“You’re gonna say no to any question that I ask, aren’t you?” he realizes after a moment.

 

“A girl still likes to be asked,” she says with a smile.

 

So he does. And when she starts to shake her head, he stops her with a soft, slow kiss.

 

“A boy still likes to hope.”

 

*

 

On the third anniversary of Victory Day, he declines an invitation to the memorial ceremony and chooses to stay behind at the office. He expects to be one of only a handful of staff in the building, so the knock on his door comes as a surprise.

 

The handle turns as soon as he calls out for his visitor to enter. A mass of blonde hair peers through the gap as the door moves, and he finds himself looking into familiar blue eyes.

 

“You’re supposed to be in Eleven,” he tells Madge with a smile.

 

She smiles back as the door clicks shut behind her. “Thought I’d take a vacation.”

 

 

 


End file.
